Selection of chronic schizophrenic patients for rehabilitation

A study was carried out to look for factors that would make useful predictors for the rehabilitation of long stay schizophrenic patients. The results showed that after 36 months of rehabilitation, the variables that were related to favourable outcome were (1) shorter duration of illness, (2) milder form of illness according to Wing's classification, (3) family acceptance, (4) less negative symptoms, and (5) less social withdrawal. Other variables like age, education, occupation, and symptoms like delusion, hallucination, thought disorder were not related to the final rehabilitation status 36 months later. Only 15% were rehabilitated at the end of 12 months and 19% at the end of 36 months. This was not unexpected as the subjects were very chronic schizophrenic patients.